Well, it is that time of year again, the end of another 12 month cycle. The perfect opportunity to reflect on the year’s accomplishments, failures, the things we learned, mistakes we made, achievements, etc. So how did you do with your goals? Were you effective at reaching them?

As we always talk about here at Think More, Be More Inc., there are 7 key areas of life. Family, Financial, Social, Emotional, Physical, Mental, and of course Spiritual with each one having its own varying degrees of importance within our daily lives, as well as in comparison to our entire lifetime. The vast majority of people never become great, or even try to master even one of these areas, let alone all 7 of them. The people that we do come into contact with that have achieved a certain level of greatness usually only have done so in one area, maybe 2. Think of the person you see in the gym all the time, they have an amazing physical body, but may be lacking in other areas of their lives. While that is the most obvious example, there are many. Some people spend lots of time reading the Bible, going to church, etc., but the rest of their life is in a shambles. Still others you may be surprised to find, have tons of money, and seem to be the epitome of the “success” sold to us on television, and across the internet all the time, in movies, and pretty much every source of media you can find, but again, that is the only area they have figured out, and behind the scenes you will find their personal relationships are horrible, their family is a wreck, they are physically on the brink of everything from a heart attack to a nervous breakdown.

What is the point of this observation? It isn’t some brilliant new concept you have never heard of before, it is point in fact, something you have heard over and over again repeatedly in your life. True happiness comes from “Balance”, and finding that balance for most of us can take a lifetime or more to figure out. So once again, here we are at the juxtaposition of one year ending, and another one beginning, and we get the chance to review our results.

For my own evaluation this year, unfortunately I did not even come close to hitting even a reasonable 50% of my goals. The one I did the best in was Family, pulling off a great summer vacation to Pike’s Peak in Colorado:

That was a great highlight, enjoying a long road trip with 3 of my kids. Unfortunately the rest of my areas of life I didn’t do so well in. Physical I actually went backwards, gaining back all the weight I had spent the better part of 2 years losing. Emotionally I made some progress, going through some counseling, as almost 4 years later, the death of the mother of my children, my wife, and best friend still has more of an effect on me than I like to admit. Mentally I lost a lot of my progress, falling out of the habit of meditating daily, and missing on more than half of the books I had planned on reading. Spiritually was kind of a stalemate year, while I didn’t make any worthy to mention progress, I don’t feel like I slipped backwards, so at least we held ground in this area. Financially is where things get frustrating. Despite some major achievements, and accomplishing some great goals, we ultimately fell short of our minimum accepted goals for the year, and as a result, we are ending the year on a downswing. Then to round things off, from a social standpoint, I didn’t really set any goals, and I didn’t really try to accomplish anything, which sort of sums up a lot of why this year will go down as more of a failure than a success.

So, why bother sharing that evaluation with the world at large? One of the first multi-millionaire’s I had the chance to work with used to talk a lot about holding yourself accountable. As a coach to other people in life, there are few things more embarrassing, than letting your students know you missed on most of your goals for a year. Most of us realize that leading by example is the best way, so many of my own goals for the New Year will be to set a better example across the board.

Still, be that as it may, my wish for each and every one of you, is that you find the time and strength to take a good hard honest look at how your 2015 went. Give yourself a chance to learn from your mistakes, so that in the year we will be celebrating the start of soon, you will have the best opportunity possible to improve, and get closer to where you want to be in life.

In closing, I want to wish all of you a very Happy New Year, thank you for your support, and let each and every one of you know I will do the best I can in the coming year to be there for you when you need it most. If there is one important lesson I have learned very well in my own lifetime, it is that none of us knows how much time we have left. All of us can have our lives taken away from us in the blink of an eye. We can go from setting goals to think more, be more, do more, and have more with our lives, to no longer breathing, in an instant. Being aware of that is an important thing. That awareness of our own mortality, is what can spur us to greater efforts, and perhaps more importantly, greater moments of appreciation. That appreciation for the life we have been given, the experiences we have been blessed with, the opportunities to better ourselves, and maybe most importantly to enjoy the people we love, is one of the secrets to unlocking true balance in one’s life.

My wish for all of us in the New Year, is that we find a way to get a little bit better in each of the 7 areas, and that we figure out how to enjoy every moment we are given, in this beautifully precious thing called LIFE!

About the Author

W.J. Vincent II has spent the last 20 years of his life building businesses from start-up to success in fields as varied as Real Estate, Technology, and Environmental Health. In January 2012, Natalia, his wife of 13 years, tragically passed away, her body having given in to her short but dramatic three-month battle with a brain tumor. Her sudden passing left W.J. a widowed father of a 1-year old baby girl and 4-year old boy of his own, along with a 12-year old boy and 15-year old girl he had been helping his mother-in-law to raise due to her battle with multiple sclerosis. Faced with a challenge greater than any he had known, W.J. was able to find strength and inspiration from the Bible. There were many miracles and messages that saw him through the darkest moments of his life. More from this author »